Errant Contact

by T. Michael Ford

  “Hmmm, interesting,” Kalaya murmured.

  “All I know is that when we sobered up the next day, the guy called me and begged me never to repeat anything that he had told me. He said that information was worth not only his job but also probably his life! And the funny thing is…I never saw his gamer handle come up again…spooky, huh?”

  Another series of flashing lights and minor alarms triggered, with Kalaya tamping them down instantly. “The primary airlock, Level 23, is toast,” she announced, putting up a live feed of soldiers taking up defensive positions in the secondary airlock antechamber and bringing in more equipment. “Kodo, a little analysis here would be swell.”

  He looked up from the engineering screens where he was still furiously working and appeared to see the intruders for the first time. Irritated at the interruption, Kodo grabbed a still shot from the camera feed and transferred it to his console, where I watched him magnify it several hundred times. He expertly examined elements of both the armor and weapons, tilting his head expressively. “I’m a little rusty, but I believe we are looking at a knockoff of imperial-level body armor and Ja’rinthe breeching carbines.” He exchanged a knowing glance with the synthetic in the captain’s chair. “Mexxak technology. There is a definite risk.”

  “My thoughts exactly.” Kalaya frowned and turned back to the main screens. “Analyzing,” she mumbled, sounding a little too much like a computer and not enough like my friend. But I suppose that with everything she was monitoring and controlling at the moment, there was precious little time for pleasantries. A few seconds later that warm, familiar glow in her eyes returned, and she smiled mischievously. “Oh, my, Admiral, what have you done?” she said to no one in particular; apparently, she wasn’t inclined to share with the class either.

  She was willing to talk to the opposition, however, as a screen moved to the forefront showing the bridge of the Redoubtable and Kittson, still in the Admiral’s chair, conversing with his bridge crew. A communication chime sounded and they all looked up in surprise.

  “Me again,” Kalaya stated matter-of-factly. “We need to talk.”

  “Talk?” Kittson sputtered. “What reason would we have to talk; you either capitulate or I destroy you. You’re supposed to be smart for a machine; I would think you could grasp the concept by now. Have you called to surrender?”

  “No,” she said tightly.

  “Then we have nothing to discuss. Kittson out!” The Admiral looked up to see Kalaya still smiling patiently at him from his own screen. “Crewman, I said sever the transmission!”

  The communications officer winced and turned away from her station to address the Admiral. “Sorry, Admiral, but every time I attempt to break contact it is instantly reinitiated! I can’t even turn off the display screen manually.”

  Kittson turned back to the screen and glared at Kalaya. “More of your nuisance meddling, I assume?”

  “Your technical malfunctions are not my concern,” she said sweetly. “What is, however, are the men and women you have entering my ship.”

  “They are not only in, but they are making substantial progress. It would be best for you and those human traitors you have on board if you surrendered before things get uglier yet. I can see to it that no one dies in the process.”

  “So you are offering to let everyone leave freely?”

  “No, of course not, blood has been spilled. Laree and her friends are looking at a naval brig for the rest of their years. You and your friend, Kodo, we’ll just take apart to see how you tick,” he chuckled.

  “Hmm…tempting, but I think I will pass on that one. No, Admiral, the presence of your marines on my ship is not the purpose of my call; however, the equipment they are carrying is. Would you care to explain the technology they are employing and where you got it? And don’t lie to me and tell me that you developed it yourselves because I know better.”

  “I warned you that you weren’t the only one with an ace up their sleeve,” Kittson said smugly, but seemed unwilling to say more.

  “Fine, I will expose your stupidity by deduction and reason, something your race appears to be sorely lacking. Your ‘ace’ may well be the end of you, your planet, and everything you hold dear.” She got up from her chair and started to pace back and forth. “Let me guess…you found a golden, double rhombus-shaped vessel sailing slowly through space. It was unpowered; in fact, it had no engines at all. Still, it was following a constant and obviously not random course. Did you ever think it might have been placed on that course deliberately?”

  I could see Kalaya’s words had piqued his interest as he sat up straighter in his chair. “Our scientists didn’t find anything to indicate there was a projected course. How do you know about that?”

  Her face took on a pained expression and she rubbed her temples absently as she continued to pace. “So you ignored the low-frequency transmissions it emitted, as well as the written warnings on the hull, and you cracked it open like some kind of piñata, didn’t you? I bet you were pleased it find it loaded with beautiful ornate battle armor, high-tech, hand-held weaponry, and lots of sparkly treasure.”

  The man’s pride and curiosity finally got the better of him and he took Kalaya’s bait. “So what? Our laws considered it space salvage. The marine techs were happy for the personal armor and weapons; it gave us quite a leap forward. My only regret was that there wasn’t any ship’s weaponry or propulsion tech on the craft itself.”

  “So what?” Kalaya echoed in disbelief. “The body in the center of the vessel wasn’t a dead giveaway? No pun intended.”

  Kittson just shook his head. “Giveaway for what? He obviously died before we arrived, the autopsies we performed were pretty inconclusive, but it did let us examine the physiology of another alien…”

  “Autopsies? You didn’t! By the stars!” She raised her hands and then dropped them in frustration. “You don’t get it, do you? A simple, unpowered ship on a leisurely tour of the galaxy. A deceased alien on a raised dais in the center of the craft, carefully and lovingly adorned for the afterlife. A fallen warrior surrounded by his personal weapons and armor! You morons raided a Mexxak funeral barge! If that wasn’t bad enough, the only Mexxak who rate a round-the-galaxy tour are members of the immediate imperial family! Do you have any idea what you have brought on yourselves?”

  The Admiral just laughed contemptuously. “Tell me all the tall tales of bogeymen you want; we found that ship eight years ago, and guess what? We’re still here and the sky hasn’t fallen yet! Besides, what do we have to fear from shrimps like them? It looked like a pigmy hippo with hands; at first, we thought it was just some food animal left behind. Eventually, our scientists extracted the brain and conceded that it could have been sentient, but probably wasn’t very smart.”

  “You would be experts in that,” Kalaya muttered. “Listen, I will give you a bit of free information for your alien database. The Mexxak are smaller and stockier in stature than we are because they evolved on a planet with much higher gravity. They are immensely strong and thick-skinned. If one of them landed on Earth, he or she would not only retain their strength but would be four to six times faster than a human. On top of that, even naked, they would be impervious to all of your civilian and military-grade weapons delivering a force or 5000 joules or less. That ceremonial armor you absconded with was designed to defend primarily against directed energy weapons, because they aren’t concerned about kinetic damage.

  “As for not being very smart, they inhabit and rule eleven star systems with thirteen habitable planets and more mining colonies than I care to mention. Bear in mind, my information is a thousand years out of date. Politically, they are ruled by an emperor; he and his family are considered living gods. A system of ‘houses of influence’ run the day-to-day operations of the imperia.

  “They are a very proud, aggressive race and are not to be trifled with. Mexxak live to fight. Fortunately, they most love to fight among themselves and generally leave other races alone unless provoked. The
Quetanae strategy for dealing with the Mexxak can be summed up succinctly – be extremely polite and stay out of their way. Other races that have challenged the Mexxak militarily have lived, or sometimes not, to regret it.

  “A side note you might find interesting – philosophically, the Mexxak claim the entire galaxy as their sovereign territory. In practice, they deign to allow other races to inhabit their galaxy, but they still maintain that the ownership is theirs alone. Hence, when someone very important dies, he or she is placed in a funerary barge and sent out for a very long, slow, ceremonial victory lap of the ‘home turf’ before the barge is directed into their home world’s star. Interfering with or desecrating the processional is considered a most grievous offense and punishable by the death of the planet or system responsible!”

  Kittson flinched slightly, but then reassumed his belligerent stance. “Stuff and nonsense from a pair of doomed refugees who will say anything to escape their fate. Besides, we took the craft with us for further study. So as far as the aliens will know, it simply vanished…end of story.”

  “Fool,” my friend said sadly. “Do you not think it probable that the Mexxak retained some way of tracking their precious cargo?”

  “But the craft had no power signature other than that low-powered warning broadcast.”

  “None that your feeble technology could detect anyway. How laughably naïve! And where might this Mexxak ship and its violated corpse be right now? Let me guess, Earth, perhaps?” The man’s eyes widened and for the first time, I noted a glint of fear in them. “Congratulations, Admiral, you are a shining example of how far humankind has progressed. Not only have you accepted bribes to the degradation of your own fleet’s efficiency, with some threats and blackmail thrown in, but you have also drawn a map for a technologically and militarily advanced race right back to Earth so that they can wipe you out. Soon the few humans who survive will be refugees as much as we Quetanae you despise.”

  “You’re bluffing. If they were going to do something, it would have happened by now!”

  “Not necessarily, space is vast and the barge’s tracking beacon may not transmit FTL. They may already be on their way with a large fleet, or they may not find out anything is amiss until next year or the year after, no way to tell really. But I assure you, it will happen. Call off your attack on my ship and hightail it back to Terra to defend your home world. In return, I will send another of our fastest FTL drones with our entire conversation loaded inside to Terra to warn them. Deal?”

  There was a chirp from the Admiral’s chair display, and he looked up with triumph in his eyes. “No deal, missy! We have just about finished burning through your secondary airlock. My marines will be infiltrating your ship in minutes. You’ve lost! And I will use the technology we gain from the Aurora to defend against any Mexxak threat, if it ever materializes!”

  Kalaya cut the volume, and the feed showing our bridge on the Redoubtable went dark. We could still see them, but they couldn’t see us. “You’ve brought this on yourselves,” she muttered to no one in particular, her eyes down in sorrow.

  “Second attempt for restart,” Kodo announced from his station. “Initiating now!” There was a momentary pause and then we all nearly jumped out of our boots as his hand slammed down loudly on the metal console leaving a substantial dent! He shouted something in a language I didn’t understand, but I was pretty sure I didn’t want to either. “Another misfire!” he grated, regaining some composure.

  Without warning, more klaxons and lights screamed for our attention from all parts of the bridge. A panel in the command chair slid aside revealing a large yellow button, which Kalaya mashed down with what appeared to be all her might. Of course, I’m sure she just triggered it digitally instead.

  A computerized male voice came over the loudspeakers, and I could hear it echoing down the corridors, probably throughout the ship. “Hull breach. Hostile intruders detected! Initializing atmospheric breach protocols. Drone internal combat locks released and ready. All crew stand ready to repel boarders!”

  Two of the screens showing the marine assault on the cannons outside went momentarily dark as giant explosions rocked the starboard side of the ship.

  “Track maneuverability down to 60%, those shaped charges are taking a toll!” Kalaya cried out. “And I’m tracking inbound, low-flying attack aircraft.”

  “Send the wyverns out to build a berm around the cannon tracks; they can’t plant charges if they are unable to reach the tracks,” Kodo said urgently. “As for the aircraft, I doubt their electronics are hardened to our standards. Try generating a pulse train along the hull using the meteorite repulsion system. It won’t be enough to disable them, but it should mess with their acquisition and guidance systems big time.

  “We’re running out of time, Kalaya, we need to get this bird out of here! Primary ignition isn’t operational. We need to approach this another way…I’m done here,” he said rising to his feet. We all looked at him searching for a glimmer of hope. However, his masked expression and the way Kalaya jumped to her feet and raced over to confront him made me feel especially uneasy.

  “No, Kodo, it’s not that bad yet; I still have some tricks up my sleeve!” she said, her voice quivering with need.

  He reached up and tenderly touched her holographic arms. “Kalaya, they have boarded my ship. It’s time to stop hiding from the past and look to the future. Did you bring up the equipment I requested?” She nodded woodenly and pointed silently to a door next to the entrance corridor on the bridge.

  “Kodo, what’s happening?” I asked.

  He briefly turned away from looking into Kalaya’s blue eyes. “The main ignition chamber overloaded and ruptured a high-pressure seal. As it sits, it is impossible for the chamber to ramp up enough psi for a controlled automated restart. We could attempt restarts for a hundred years and nothing would happen.”

  “But surely you have contingencies? You have more than one main engine, right?” Drik guessed.

  “Yes, but the number One Main is the keystone unit. A failure to fire is a very serious ship-threatening event. Once the primary engine is flooded with reaction mass, it just sits there like an unexploded bomb if it isn’t ignited. Mechanical lockout protocols, which even Kalaya can’t override, have been activated and we can’t even attempt to start the other engines until One Main fires or is manually evacuated.”

  “So where does that leave us?”

  “There is a way to manually inject an ignition event directly into the primary chamber, bypassing the ignition chamber altogether. But it can only be done by two authorized crew members roughly simultaneously, one at the primary engineering control station and the other in the auxiliary power center.”

  “But those areas are all the way at the back of the ship!” I gasped, standing up myself and striding over to join my friends. “And the marines just entered near the center!”

  Kodo just nodded and extracting himself from Kalaya’s clinging arms, stepped over to the door she had indicated earlier. At his touch, the door slid aside. Another touch at a panel within activated a carousel-type device, which delivered something. Stepping around Kalaya’s hologram, I could finally see what it was. Hanging there was a suit of armor that looked like it was made to fight mythical dragons. It was pure black and had interlocking layers of heavy plating. Unlike the suit he wore to retrieve the wyverns, this was plainly no civilian model. In the few small gaps I could see in the plate, a thick, black wire mesh seemed to glow with embedded wiring. The chest, waist, and thigh areas were festooned with pouches, holsters, and weapon connections. A pair of knives as long as my arms was strapped to the sides of the tall boots, and another smaller set across the shoulders. Whoever this was designed for meant to go to war.

  “Oh, yeah! That’s what I’m talking about!” Max shouted excitedly, coming up alongside me. “Where’s mine?”

  “Maxwell, a suit like this would kill you the instant you put it on,” Kalaya whispered sadly, looking at me when she said i
t. “It interfaces with Quetanae-formulated nanites to form a checks-and-balance against unauthorized use by pirates or the like. This particular model is the most advanced combat unit our police force ever developed.

  Kodo was already stripping off his technician’s jumpsuit. I was horrified at the thought of what going into combat would do to him, but I have to admit, I was both disappointed and intrigued when his undressing revealed a white gossamer undersuit. The undersuit had small metal ports distributed across all of the major muscle groups, as well as matching glow lines similar to the combat suit. I glanced at Kalaya, but she was so preoccupied she couldn’t spare a comment on my ogling.

  Kodo put his hand on the breastplate and immediately, a glowing line traced the outline of his handprint. I was amazed that even as tall as Kodo stands, the armor seemed to dwarf him. A second later, with a hydraulic sounding hiss, the main cavities of the armor split apart revealing a compartment that seemed custom-molded to his frame. Kodo lifted his hand to caress Kalaya’s hair and slide it gently down her tear-streaked face. They must have exchanged something between their implants because she finally nodded bravely and stepped back.

  Exhaling a deep breath, Kodo strode forward and contorted his body around the suit’s projections and locking mechanisms. Finally satisfied, he triggered the suit to seal up. Snapping back into place, he was now entirely encased in the imposing armor except for his head. Stepping out as a single unit, I could swear I felt the floor shake with every step he took.

  Circling around him, Max could only utter, “Damn! Are you sure I can’t have one?”

  “Wait, “Hannah exclaimed. “Didn’t you say you needed two authorized crew members to activate this gizmo to start the engine? If one of us can’t do it…does Kalaya count?”